Since I can remember I have been totally inspired by aviation and especially helicopters. I've always wanted to design, build and fly them, and be a part of every aspect of making a helicopter fly. Still do. I wasn't interested in going to college, so I decided becoming a pilot would be the best way to start out, more fun too : ) I looked into the military and didn't find this route particularly suited for me. About a year after I would have graduated from the high school class of 1990 (had I not dropped out), I started learning to fly the Robinson R22 at Classic Helicopter Corp. in Seattle, WA. By October, 1992 I had my commercial and flight instructor licenses for helicopters. I had trouble finding work right away so I ended up doing many other things for about five and a half years before I finally came back to helicopters and started flying professionally. My first job was...

Mazzei Flying Service - April-May 1998

Mazzei is located in Fresno, CA. I flew an R22 here doing mostly flight instruction. I didn't make enough money here, and so, for financial reasons, I started looking elsewhere for work after about a month. And, only seven weeks after arriving in Fresno I was off to...

Rotorway - June-September 1998

Rotorway International is located in Chandler, AZ, just south of Phoenix at Stellar Airpark. They had salary pay, medical benefits and normal working hours. This promised to be much better and, it was, but, the type of flying was very limited. Teaching mostly hovering and being limited to basically one airport for training, I was growing bored. I flew 162 hours in the Exec and learned quite a lot about the difference between homebuilts and certified aircraft. After a few months I started calling other flight schools around the country and found one in Dallas, TX that seemed quite promising. By the end of September I was on my way to...

Sky Helicopters - October 1998-March 1999

Sky Helicopters is located at the Garland/DFW heliport right on the northeast edge of Dallas. A small FBO run by a husband and wife, they do quite a lot of photo and tour work on top of the instruction. They also had an R44 for the tours and that was quite nice to fly. All in all this was a good place to build time. By the time spring rolled around though, I was ready for something new. On the 2nd of March I gave them notice that I was leaving at the end of the month, and that very day I also started training a new student. Dick West owns TPI, a liner installation business (more info is located on the link below), and travels across the country for much of the year. His goal was to get his helicopter pilots license and buy his own aircraft to take with him on the road. Problem was, he didn't have enough time to do all of the training before he was scheduled to leave. So, he offered me the job of going on the road with them to continue his training. I thought about it for a while and on April 1, I was the new corporate pilot for...

TPI Inc. - April 1999-March 2000

TPI is based in Alvarado, TX about 20 miles south of Fort Worth. In April 1999 we did a liner job for a small landfill Just south of San Antonio and by May we were in Bushton, Kansas doing a job for a gas plant. We traveled and worked for about 7 months, mostly across the central U.S. We trained and I gave a lot of rides to people we did jobs for. I also got some external load time and was able to use the helicopter a few times for personal trips. By Thanksgiving we were done for the season and were back in Texas. I was still there for Christmas but by New years I was in San Diego visiting and on my way up to Oakland to get my instrument license. In February I finished in Oakland and headed back to Texas for a short time while trying to find my next job. After talking to quite a few companies I finally chose...

Columbia Helicopters - April-August 2000

On March 26, 2000 I went to work for Columbia Helicopters as a co pilot flying the Boeing Vertol model 107. Based out of Aurora, Oregon, we traveled quite a bit doing mostly logging and a little firefighting. After about 4 months of being a copilot I was tired of not getting any PIC so I quit and found a new job working for...

Tex-Air Helicopters - August 2000-March 2001

Tex-Air Helicopters is based out of Houston Hobby airport, they operate mostly in the Gulf of Mexico supporting the offshore oil industry. They operate eurocopter products almost entirely. Enjoyed working here but I just didn't want to stay in the gulf. The flying is really boring and not very challenging. So I am off to Alaska to work for...

Era Helicopters - April 2001-December 2002

Era Helicopters is based out of Anchorage, Alaska. Era flies a wide variety of helicopter missions and also has a fixed wing airline. I flew tours on the glaciers in Juneau for the 2001 summer. I did a Bell 212 transition in November of that year. In 2002 I did a fire season in Idaho flying relief on 2 initial attack contracts in the Astar. Now I have just quit Era as of the end of 2002. I just bought a house in Arlington, Washington and I'm tired of all the traveling and leaving home.

Hi Line Helicopters - March 2003-Present

Hi Line Helicopters operates out of Darrington, WA. Two Hughes 500s and a UH-1H Huey do mostly utility type work, lots of longline, fires, search and rescue, and lots of other government work. This place is great for me because it's local.